Billy McFarland, the supposedly wealthy co-organizer of the disastrous Fyre Festival, arrived at a court hearing with a public defender on Saturday before being released on $300,000 bail following his Friday arrest for wire fraud
Time

Wilmington Mayor Michael Purzycki's 31-year-old son isn't just the chief executive officer of Jerry Media, a multimedia empire centered on the wildly popular meme-making Instagram page and brand @F—Jerry.

He's now a film producer preparing to drop his first movie: a Netflix documentary about the failed 2017 Fyre Festival in the Bahamas — a disastrous "luxury" music festival that left attendees stranded and the festival organizer in prison.

Fyre Festival attendees in the Bahamas in 2017.(Photo: Courtesy of Netflix)

"Powerful models built this festival and then one picture of cheese on toast ripped down the festival," Purzycki is seen saying to the camera.

A disastrous festival promoted by supermodels

The film, which will be released Friday, promises to be an "exclusive behind the scenes look at the infamous unraveling" of the festival, which was created by entrepreneur (and now convicted felon) Billy McFarland, along with rapper Ja Rule.

The festival, held in the Bahamas, was supposed to be a glittering experience for the affluent featuring performances by in-demand national acts such as Migos and Blink-182 as well as ritzy amenities and bikini-clad supermodels.

But when the first festivalgoers arrived after paying between $4,000 to $12,000 to attend, they quickly realized they weren't getting what they thought they were.

Instead of luxury villas, accommodations were disaster relief tents with dirt floors and wet mattresses. The gourmet meals they were promised were replaced with sandwiches. And there was little support staff with the festival devolving into a free-for-all once attendees realized they were largely on their own.

After one festivalgoer tweeted his meal — two slices of American cheese and two slices of whole wheat bread with limp lettuce and mealy tomato slices — and others began complaining on social media, the festival was postponed.

The spectacle, which landed McFarland in federal prison in October for six years on wire fraud charges related to the festival, has spawned a pair of documentaries.

Social media posts from unhappy festival-goers were the first signs of trouble coming out of Fyre Festival.(Photo: Courtesy of Netflix)

War of words: 'Fyre' vs. 'Fyre Fraud'

While Purzycki's "FYRE" will begin on the Netflix video streaming service this weekend, a competing documentary, "Fyre Fraud," was released Monday on streaming service Hulu with no advance notice.

The move has sparked accusations of conflict-of-interest between the competing documentaries.

When "Fyre Fraud" dropped Monday, "FYRE" director Chris Smith told sports and pop culture website The Ringer that the filmmakers behind "Fyre Fraud" paid McFarland for an exclusive interview which is featured prominently in their film.

“[McFarland] told us that they were offering $250,000 for an interview," Smith said.

"Fyre Fraud" co-director Jenner Furst admitted to The Ringer that they paid McFarland for an eight-hour interview and for licensed behind-the-scenes footage, but said it was less than $250,000.

And then Furst said it was "FYRE" that actually had the ethics problem since F---Jerry helped market Fyre Festival.

In her interview, Furst said, "I feel like there’s a bigger ethically compromised position, and that’s going and partnering with folks who marketed the Fyre Festival and were well aware that this was not going to happen as planned."

In turn, Netlfix released a statement defending Jerry Media's involvement in the film.

Attendees of Fyre Festival arrive in the Bahamas in 2017.(Photo: Courtesy of Netflix)

"We were happy to work with Jerry Media and a number of others on the film. At no time did they, or any others we worked with, request favorable coverage in our film, which would be against our ethics," it read. "We stand behind our film."

Purzycki defends Jerry Media

Purzycki, who did not respond to interview requests from The News Journal this week, spoke about his company's involvement in the festival with Town Square Delaware in an article published last week.

"We were responsible for their social media designs and helping with marketing, pre-launch," he told the online publication. "We were one of six New York marketing agencies working together. One of the agencies did a great job: the event sold out. Where the festival failed was on the island."

The rival documentaries and ensuing sniping have garnered both films plenty of free advertising this week thanks to a wave of articles about the rivalry. The Hollywood Reporter wrote Tuesday that the films "make for an often irresistible and provocative pairing."

The reviews are in

TV critics are also weighing in.

Ahead of its release, the 97-minute "FYRE" had a strong score of 92 on film review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes with "Fyre Fraud" not ranked.

A sampling of the reviews for "FYRE":

TV Guide: "Just when you think 'FYRE'...couldn't get any more unbelievable, it gets more unbelievable," Malcolm Venable wrote. "'FYRE' may be a plainly told tale about how one guy conned a whole generation, but its immersive reporting and restraint make it a masterful meditation on 21st century culture and fame, as well as the societal norms that allow young white men like McFarland to bluff, bluster, bullsh-t and bargain their way to the top without resistance or concern for who might be collateral damage. It's a defining true crime story for the Internet age."

Fyre Festival founder Billy McFarland, who is currently serving a six-year prison sentence for wire fraud related to the failed festival.(Photo: Courtesy of Netflix)

Consequence of Sound: "It’s a gripping, fascinating watch, an elegantly assembled portrait of the end result of influencer culture and late-stage capitalism – the blind leading the blind into an empty, insubstantial image of success and luxury that turns out to be nothing but smoke," Clint Worthington penned.

The Guardian: "The film’s ace is how it contrasts the 'official' high-resolution material with salvaged social media content and genuinely startling behind-the-scenes footage," declared Adrian Horton. "And then there’s the footage of the festival itself, a distinctly 2017 horror show almost too ripe for parody: wealthy and young music enthusiasts, chasing tequila shots and the best light, reduced to looting mattresses while carrying a selfie stick."

Time: "The apparent ease with which McFarland duped so many professionals (most of them white men) into helping him defraud thousands of 'average losers' (also mostly white men, judging by festival footage) is a depressing indictment on a festival industry in which images of scantily clad models gyrating against Instagrammable sunsets are presumed to be a better investment than good music," Jusy Berman concluded.

Vogue: "Smith does a terrific job of stringing it all into a taut narrative—but the real revelation of Fyre is in the insider interviews. Here are software engineers who worked for McFarland’s app, event organizers he hired to pull off the festival, and the social media marketers who aided and abetted his illusion. They all speak candidly about how they were caught up and carried along. It’s startling to see so many urbane, sophisticated, young creatives—the kind of cool kids our media economy reveres—ensnared in old-fashioned criminality," Taylor Antrim wrote.